Sunday, July 30, 2006

The York Embroiderers' Guild had an exhibition in June at Askham Bryan on the outskirts of York. This is a triannual event and my first - it blew me away.Anyway, I entered a competition and I will blog that at a later date but here is a taster from my piece.After the exhibition some of the items were kept to one side and are now showing at Woldgate College, Pocklington, which is literally down the hill (Wold) from where I live. So for the next 2 weekends I have volunteered in the afternoons to go along and look after the exhibits and be on hand for queries etc.Busy, busy, busy I also have to do the books and produce invoices for our local afternoon school club - no time for housework this weekend!(category: embroidery)

I now know what the problem is regarding the different views of my blog - at work my monitor is set to 800x600 resolution because I have difficulty seeing the screen set back on my desk and at home I have a resolution of 1024x768 which 80% of people use.

This means 800x600 see the blog on a full screen, and 1024x768 see the blog down the middle and if I set my pictures with word wrap and put in spaces to move some of the words down to align them to the pictures it looks brilliant on 1024.. but atrocious on 800..

As yet I have not found a way to make both happy except to posting pictures in the middle with words above or below (as per DigitalGran).

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Well here it is - my first attempt at a complete block. Upto now all I have done are a few ATC's, which I was very happy with but because I was in a rush for a meeting forgot to take a photo before I swapped them.Anyway, tonight I have created a nude block with a digital print on percale of some osteospermum (Cape Daisy) flowers at the centre (of course from my Mums lovely garden).So now I can join in with Sharon B's 100 details for a 100 days of which I have been an avid follower, but because of other commitments have not been able to join in.(category: embroidery)

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

What is going on! posts look fine on my PC at home but when I look at work they are a mess. Will have to investigate further. Maybe I will have to take off the word wrap and post words and pictures underneath each other.Oh and what is with the date stamp! I have it set to British Summer Time but the stamp sometimes says otherwise.Any ideas welcome.

Neil has taken up a new hobby and has an allotment, although up to now has not shown any interest in gardening! Must be a male thing!. Anyway, I sometimes accompany him and yesterday I got a few photos of poppies, flowering teasles, which are rampant on the plot - the poppy shot I particularly like and could be an inspiration for a future project.

The last flower is an onion.

We cannot grow veg in our garden as our house is on the first Wold on the edge of the Vale of York, and the soil is heavy with clay.

Sunday, July 23, 2006

Went on a day school yesterday (my last one before the summer break), Machine Embroidery with Eileen Gibson. This is the second class of 3 - I will blog the first one later as I was very pleased with the bag I made.

Anyway, this class was to explore the use of free machine embroidery using water soluble fabrics and an embroidery hoop.

OK not wanting to make excuses for myself but I was feeling a little under the weather as the previous day I was diagnosed with acute vertigo due to an ear infection. But nothing was going to keep me away from this class. As I had to travel about 20 miles, Neil my husband very kindly gave me a lift as I was not up to driving.

The day went very well and Eileen is an excellent teacher.

We started with a 9 inch square piece of material (I chose a piece of hand dyed silk from a scarf that I purchased at our local charity shop) then machined pin tucks across the bias, finishing by joining to sides together to make a conical shape.

The conical was then pinned to the water soluble sheet (I used Romeo) once the sheet had been stretched over the frame, the shape was stitched down then we were set free to machine to our hearts content, making sure that all stitched interlinked.

At this stage Judy said that they all looked like 'Sorting Hats'! and some of the doll makers were very pleased with the idea to make them into hats. However, the finished items are meant to be the other way up (small bags) - maybe to hang on a wall - but at the end of the day they are what ever you want them to be.

Once we were happy then the fabric was dissolved in warm soapy water - but as you see mine needs a lot more soaking as it is still quite stiff. It is not a disaster yet! but I thought I would show it to you all anyway as a before picture.

By this time I was pooped! and felt that I could not go on to do a handle.

Hopefully during the week I may have time to restart and finish the little wall hanging with handle and embellishments.

Thursday, July 20, 2006

I was just searching in my sewing room for a small piece of aida, when I came across this piece of canvas work that I completed last October when I was on holiday. It is a canvas work sampler consisting of Norwich stitch (that's the woven diamond shaped squares), cross-cornered cushion stitch and a form of Half Rhodes - perhaps I could convert it into a panel for a bag? but suggestions welcome.As I have previously said 'I am new to embroidery' and what I have learnt from people who have been doing this for many years is: 'not to have too many UFO's (Unfinished Objects)' - so perhaps by blogging this it will galvanise me to get going....So watch this space (in a year or so!!!)

Monday, July 17, 2006

So you thought darning was for socks and knitwear! - well here is a picture that I created using left over threads and beads. For the water I used strips of a plastic sandwich bag that I twisted to create a lovely thread with a sheen. However, I am not too happy with the sky but then again even painting skies are difficult - I will have to investigate other techniques.

Sunday, July 16, 2006

I am hopefully going to re-build my web site and then house various galleries and projects so that my web log will be able to link to archive categories easily. The trouble is time to do all this, but it should be worth it in the long run.

Firstly I am going to have to have a plan, then some graphics (this is where my 15 year old son may be able to help his old mum out!)

Just a few photos that I took whilst visiting my mums garden, I expecially like the rose as it appears so perfect and such a lovely colour. My mum lives near Morecambe in Lancashire - she loves her garden and always has such a wonderful array of colours.

Saturday, July 15, 2006

Here is a canvas work picture that I finished for the guild meeting at the beginning of July. A picture of Loch Ness inspired “Lakeside” even though the final piece took on a Lakeland scene. The magnificent colours were what drew me to the picture.

As I was creating a piece of canvas work I started by “pixelating” the picture on my computer, as a basis for the background (as seen below). This was printed onto a piece of canvas to which I applied a cross corner stitch to represent the pixels.Once this was complete, I felt that the picture was very regimented so I decided to break up the foreground by applying free embroidery stitches.Here is some detail:

"Embroidery"I went on a day school with the embroiderers' guild 'Textured Landscapes' where we explored painting canvases and embellishing them with anything to hand.Here I painted a landscape and applied dried wheat then embellished it with embroidery.

The seed head and the centre of the poppy are pieces of stump work.Although you may not be able to see threads were also painted into the canvas to create texture.

This is my little space on the ethernet where I can "witter" on about my creative side because if I talk to my husband - he nods, and agrees but mostly just lets me "witter" on to my hearts content - I love him really!

The left side of your brain controls verbal ability, attention to detail, and reasoning.
Left brained people are good at communication and persuading others.
If you're left brained, you are likely good at math and logic.
Your left brain prefers dogs, reading, and quiet.

The right side of your brain is all about creativity and flexibility.
Daring and intuitive, right brained people see the world in their unique way.
If you're right brained, you likely have a talent for creative writing and art.
Your right brain prefers day dreaming, philosophy, and sports.